Cardigan disaster

A little while ago I had a washing disaster with my favourite hand knitted cardigan and it ended up like this:

Whoops - I'd hand washed it and then put it in the washing machine on a very low spin, which it apparently didn't like. 

This is the Geodesic cardigan by Connie Chang Chinchio.  I made this back in 2012, and at first it was too big.... but over the last 3 years it has become a firm favourite, so I was very sad when it came from the wash looking like this.

Not to be deterred I wet it again and gave it a very huge block..

This was more, I have to do something rather than putting is straight in the bin attempt.

It came out looking like this:

So, better, but now it's wavy around the edges from where I pinned it.

While I'm not quite ready to let go of it yet, I have cast on another cardigan. 

It's the Martha cardigan (eyelet version) from Rowan 37.  I've converted it to be knitted in the round and when I get both sleeves to the underarm I'm going to attempt to do the armholes using the EZ set-in sleeve method (p86 Knitting workshop by Elizabeth Zimmermann). 

I love wearing cardigans but I seem to have a real lack of hand made cardigans - this oversight needs to be addressed. 

Tablecloth top

David was travelling back from the UK the other week and had the instructions to try to get me a sewing magazine - I don't get them all the time, but once in a while it's nice.  He let me know the options and I looked them up to see what I fancied.  I ultimately went for Simply sewing, but while I was browsing I noticed there was a free template to download for the Anna Tunic by Amy Butler in the Sew Home & Style magazine.  Now, of course you're meant to buy the magazine in order to get the instructions - but where's the fun in that? ;-)

I used the magic of the Internet to learn how the back is supposed to look, and get a few snippets about what people thought of the pattern - the general consensus seemed to be that it's a pretty simple pattern, that attaching the yoke had caused some problems and the armholes tended to be too high. 

In my stash I had some fabric which I picked up for free at a local street fair - so free pattern and free fabric, seemed to be made for each other.

So, it came together pretty easily, I didn't have problems attaching the yoke, but then I probably didn't do it the way the pattern intended, but it looks fine.

 I ended up reducing the height of the yoke by about 3cm as it was far too height around my neck and I found that the armholes were too high.... I lowered them by about 1 1/2".

The original pattern had a lining, which I skipped, so I used bias binding to bind the armholes and did French seams.

I also added a belt loop at each side to keep the belt under control a bit, it can then wrap around the back and tie at the front.

I found some pretty buttons in my stash to finish off the yoke at the back and to keep the free theme going.

I think I like the top, it's maybe a little tablecloth-esque and I think it looks better with trousers than shorts, but I like the colour and the shape and that I could make it completely from stash materials with a free pattern :-)

Green spotty Butterick B6026 shirt

I think this is one of the tidiest things I've ever made....

I was reading Rhonda Buss' blog the other week, she often posts an inspiration post on a Monday morning, and on this particular morning she posted about dart manipulation.  I love a little added subtle detail to clothes - I think it elevates them above the normal and often adds a little femininity.  In this particular post she linked to Butterick B6026, so I thought I'd give it a go.  After realising that it was a ridiculous amount to buy it here in Switzerland, I ordered it from the UK.  I had some fabric in my stash that I had bought from Just Sew in Penrith (probably my favourite sewing shop - it's convenient for when we visit my parents, but they often have nice fabric in at a reasonable price, especially compared to the absurd price of fabric here in Switzerland).

Anyway, pattern and fabric chosen I got going...

There are clusters of darts at the waist, neckline and the sleeves - in order to mark on all my lines I used a pilot, frixon pen... I read in a blog (can't remember which one) that lines drawn on by these pens disappear when you iron them - and then come back again when you pop the fabric in the freezer.  I haven't had a need for the latter part of this, but for drawing lines on fabric this pen is great.

 Sleeve dart lines...

...and sewn

I also used it to add a sewing line to the corners of my collars to keep them neat:

As you can see, once it's stitched and ironed the pen disappears.  I did, of course, check this on a scrap of the fabric before I went ahead and did this - especially on the darts where I was marking on the right side of the fabric.

Anyway, back to the shirt - it came together really well - everything lined up nicely :-)  To get a really neat finish I constructed it using French seams throughout (have I mentioned I love French seams?)

I sewed a straight size 10, with no alterations....

I think the shape of it's really flattering - it almost makes me look like I've got a waist!

 And the dart details add just a little extra something.  The ones at the neckline get a little lost under the collar, but I think the others, especially in this spotty fabric look really nice.

As I said, I'm also proud of the inside: French seams, including the armhole seam.

I'm also pleased with how neat my collar turned out.

The buttons I used were in my stash - I had a set of 6 white shirt buttons... I think these might have come from my Nanna as they were on a pretty old piece of card.  I then added a single wooden button at the collar, just for fun.

All in all I'm really pleased with this shirt and how it fits.

wear what I make - update

At the end of March I posted about a faux suede jacket I was planning on re purposing....  I thought I would give a bit of an update on progress.

It appears that I do have enough fabric to make the Burda silk motorcycle jacket I had hoped to...

Here are a couple of pictures of where I've got to so far:

I'm not rushing this project - it's quite tricky.  The zip had me stuck for a little while as it needed to be shortened and despite looking up how to do it on the Internet and being persuaded it was easy peasy I couldn't do it and had to get David's brute strength involved.  We did it in the end and it's half way installed.

The collar didn't go on quite right at first...well, the left side was fine, but the right side was too long - I'm not entirely sure what the problem was, but I ended up increasing the front dart that you can see on the picture above.  I'm hoping that was the mistake and occurred due to inaccuracy in my mark transfers or sewing and doesn't come back and bite me later on.

The welt pockets were a bit tricky too - I did a couple of dummy runs on some other fabric first - just as well as the first one didn't work at all.... the welts didn't cover the zip, but I wrote notes and got it figured out and managed to successfully make a pair of zipped welt pockets.

Proof that there's two!  And not too bad....

And a picture of the back - just to be thorough.

The sleeves still aren't cut out - I haven't figured out if I have enough fabric in the original huge boxy sleeves to do the two piece sleeve drafted in this pattern, or if I have to do some redrafted one piece sleeve to use the fabric I have available.  That's something that can wait till after the summer holidays.

wearing what I make - Vogue 2117

It's hot at the moment, so today I'm wearing a sundress I made back when I lived in Knoxville. It's made using Vogue 2117 and it looks like I cut a straight 10.  This dress is quite neat inside, with seams finished off, which is good for some of my previous sewing!

It doesn't often come out of my wardrobe, although I don't think it looks too bad... I'm just naturally a dress wearer.  So, why don't I wear it - apart from the not really wearing dress thing?

I'm not sure if you can tell from this photo, but the straps have ended up a bit wide on me and the armholes are a little high - the edges are all finished off using bias binding, so if I could find some that's similar to what I used originally I could at least sort out the armhole problem, which might make me wear it more.  I've pinned the straps to my bra so they don't slide down all the time. 

Today I've been mostly wearing it with a cardigan, which covers up all the problems and keeps the straps in place, I've felt pretty comfortable in it - so I think I should give it a few more outings out of the wardrobe than it's used to.